By Jim Coggins

"I am filled with hope," writes sociologist Reginald Bibby. The reason? "Teens in Canada are still mostly morally healthy, decent folks whom you would want as a neighbour."

This is one of the more encouraging findings in Bibby's new book, The Emerging Millennials: How Canada's Newest Generation is Responding to Change & Choice.

Bibby is one of the most respected sociologists in Canada, known for his in-depth surveys of Canadian youth. His career has been focused on finding out what teens actually think. His latest survey, of 4,746 high school students aged 15 - 19, was conducted in 2008. This is a very high number for a study of this type.

Friendship & freedom

Asked what they found "very important," the Millennials in this latest survey responded emphatically: friendship (86 percent) and freedom (85 percent). These values rated higher than a comfortable life (75 percent), a good education (73 percent), success (73 percent), family life(67 percent), money (44 percent), looks (40 percent) and popularity (16 percent). They also ranked much higher than did spirituality (27 percent) and involvement in a religious group (13 percent).

Along with these values, Millennials also demonstrated that they hold a number of "traditional" moral values. Eighty-four percent said trust is "very important," and 81 percent said honesty is. Millennials also value humour (75 percent), concern for others (65 percent), politeness (64 percent), forgiveness (60 percent) and working hard (55 percent).

Relativism rules

Nonetheless, almost two-thirds of Millennials said that "What's right or wrong is a matter of personal opinion." When asked what they based their own moral values on, 43 percent said "how I feel at the time," and seven percent said "a personal decision." Sixteen percent cited their parents' views, three percent said their friends, and only 10 percent based their moral decisions on "religion" ?- slightly below the 12 percent who said their moral views were based on "nothing."

Continue article >>

"Where the relativism comes in," Bibby writes, "is not with respect to the value itself, but in how it is applied." Eighty-one percent of Millennials valued honesty, which is not far off the 95 percent of those born before 1946 who value honesty. However, when the Millennials were asked what they would do if they were walking away from a sales counter and realized the salesperson had given them $10 more than they were supposed to receive, only 38 percent said they would return the money (compared to 90 percent of those born before 1946).

On the other hand, this does not mean Millennials are not acting morally. In fact, the April 13 issue of Maclean'smagazine was so impressed by some of Bibby's findings that it dubbed Millennials "the tame generation." From 2000 to 2008, the percentage of teens who drink alcohol declined from 78 percent to 71 percent, the percentage who smoke dropped from 37 percent to 22 percent, the percentage who use marijuana or hashish dropped from 37 percent to 31 percent, and the percentage who never have sex rose from 51 percent to 56 percent. In fact, teens are having sex less frequently than seniors.

Teens have not fully embraced traditional values, of course. Seventy-two percent of Millennials said they approved of sex before marriage "when people love each other"; but that is down from 82 percent in 2000 and 87 percent in 1992. Similarly, 44 percent approve and accept homosexual relations; and another 28 percent disapprove, but accept them. However, that level is actually lower than the approval rate among Baby Boomers (born 1946 - 1965).

Bibby suggests Millennials' moral values may be partly the result of lingering religious teaching: "God and religious groups may have eclipsed somewhat from their lives, but they have left huge shadows."

PART II - to come

REGINALD W. BIBBY, Ph.D., holds the Board of Governors Research Chair in the Department of Sociology at The University of Lethbridge. For the past three decades, he has been monitoring social trends in Canada through a series of well-known Project Canada national surveys of adults and teenagers. These surveys are producing historic, unparalleled trend data, and have been described by colleagues and the media as "a national treasure."

The Emerging Millennialsis available at bookstores across Canada. More information about Reginald Bibby's work with Project Teen Canada can be found at: reginaldbibby.com.

May 14/2009